Show Them What You're 'About'

Looking for a cool way to show your contacts a perfect snapshot of your personal or professional brand? About.me is a simple and elegant solution.

What Is About.me?

About.me is a free service that offers a visually appealing splash page for you to showcase who you are with a customizable background image and bio. Your visitors can find links to all of your online content (your LinkedIn profile, Twitter page, Facebook timeline, etc.) on this one web page. Talk about cleaning up your email signature to one web address. You can add the your About.me URL to your business card and even have your business card's QR code point to it, for those with smart phones.

Sounds cool, right? Why not give it a whirl? Here are a few tips in getting started:

Add a Custom Background Image

The default images leave something to be desired. Personally, I would always customize it. A professional looking headshot might be preferable for some, while others may choose a corporate image or something less telling. The optimal background image size is 1680x1050 pixels giving you the opportunity to incorporate a very detailed image. If you are struggling with your image, the About.me blog has some great suggestions to easily create interesting backgrounds with less detailed images.

Add a Brief Bio

There's no need to re-invent the wheel here, if you have a bio that you currently use as part of your personal branding on other social networks or your blog, stick to your message. If you need it, here is some excellent advice on creating a social media bio.

Add Networks and Custom Pages

There are 21 services to choose from including Facebook profiles and pages, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr, Instagram and more. If you need to, you can also add custom links for options that aren't listed, such as Pinterest, Delicious, Klout or others. If you have your resume posted online, adding a custom link to it would be a great way to gain more interest in what you have to offer.

Tweaking Your Page

Play around with the font, colors, and design until you come up with something you're happy with. There are a lot of great examples on the Featured Directory page to draw inspiration from. I'd also suggest adding tags to your profile. Tags will allow others to find you on About.me when they search for those keywords. And lastly, check back every so often to view your stats! About.me offers some simple analytics for you to see how many people have viewed your page, where they came from and what they did when they were there!

Shawn McGowan has worked as a Social Media Marketing Coordinator with a passion for brand transparency and over 10 years of sales/customer service experience. A native of East Millinocket, Maine, Shawn grew up at the foot of Mount Katahdin and graduated from the University of Maine Presque Isle with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA).